I walk over the marsh saying I am I: and must follow that furrow, not copy another. That is the only justification for my writing, living. – Virginia Woolf.

They left each other at 60. It is considered to be an abnormality within the neighborhood to be leaving your spouse at 60 because literally no one does it. People do not grow out of love at 60, instead they fall into a rhythmic beat that is embedded with familiar daily habits.

The leaving carried some sense of commemoration for both. The last strands of mutual responsibility were fulfilled as their youngest child, Paul finally graduates from college. The very fact that they are now 60, the age where they are closer to a departure that is eternal had encouraged a deeper questioning into things; issues that both have studiously and ritualistically evaded for decades. Now, hiding is no longer an option.

She wondered, if greed was in her blood because she had always long for something more from him. Something more than a question could give, more than an answer could provide. She had felt sinful asking, as though contentment is a concept she can never successfully learn.

“How is your day?”

“ It is fine.”

Silence.

The eager checking in and the abrupt checking out were always shocking for her. The eagerness on his part to disengage from conversation – to refuse her the privilege of attention – is something she could never understand. But the foreignness gradually dissolves and familiarity falls between the strangeness of what has become ordinary.

It would soon become a game that she plays to amuse herself.

Before the question is asked, she would place a wager with herself. What would he say today?

“How is your day?”

“How is your day?”

“How is your day?”

“How is your day?”

She won most of the time, it was always the same treatment. Soon, what had started out as being amusing begin to bore her. She lost interest in the game and in him. No longer wanting to participate, the questions stopped.

They went about their days – Work, home, kids. There were laughter and joys. Parties were held to celebrate anniversaries, birthdays and graduations but no one wanted to stop and evaluate the question. No one dared for they no longer could differentiate if the question is a root or a chain.

When they parted, neither of them left anything behind. She took everything that was hers. He took what was left of him, folding the crumbled pieces while making desperate attempts to smooth the clumsy blotchy sides of himself that have been woven during their marriage.

How is your day?

“It is fine”

Nothing can be more dismal than opening the door and getting no response.

]]>https://jochin.com/2016/02/18/the-bewildering-story-of-a-question/feed/0DSC_0653skymusingsFoliage of the Hearthttps://jochin.com/2016/02/12/heart-full/
https://jochin.com/2016/02/12/heart-full/#respondFri, 12 Feb 2016 08:27:21 +0000http://jochin.com/?p=3038]]>“What is your heart made of?”, he asked me that December afternoon when Melbourne was radiating under it’s summer heat. My skin shone both in love for the love of my life and for the warm summer heat. We were taking a leisurely walk around the city, exploring it’s nooks and crannies, immersing in a history that did not belong to us as migrants. I shifted uncomfortably in my steps, I loved this man so much for his willingness to delve into deepness, to confront the difficult edges of life. As his eyes pored into mine, watching me expectantly, my body twitched a little, “Years of reading the intellectuals will not serve this.” I thought to myself.

I did not know the answer then. Feigning confidence, I had planted a kiss firmly on his lips and brushed the question away, allowing the words to float between the air of our shared breaths.

But the years have taught me countless lessons. What I do not know then, I do now. My heart is an art piece. It is made up of not one but countless materials. It is not fragile like porcelain but not durable and hard like metal. My heart is beating for many things and for people. It is not inclusive but not exclusive. Though it is privately mine, it is also open to others for giving.

I have risk the condition of my heart time and again and would risk it all over again if I have to. But please, admire the lines on my heart I would tell you. They are caused by these chanced adventures of life. Muse through the converging and diverging lines, the thicks and thins that are always dancing to a special song.

The indentations of these lines have created gradations of colours, they are a constant wonder to me. How many tones does a single colour possess? They are like shadows and one can sit very still, allow this understanding that some mysteries must be kept as unknown secrets. There is humility in being okay with not knowing.

My heart is a constant but it is also growing at every turn of my life. I do not know what is around the bend, but I know that I would extend a heartfelt welcome to what is ahead. I will trust my heart and know with every fibre of my being, that it is well.

]]>https://jochin.com/2016/02/04/adorn-you/feed/0R1-03101-021AskymusingsWriting Me.https://jochin.com/2015/11/19/writing-me/
https://jochin.com/2015/11/19/writing-me/#respondThu, 19 Nov 2015 19:21:52 +0000http://jochin.com/?p=2988]]>My mind went ‘click’ and the lights in my consciousness went out. I knew what was going on but I wanted to loom in the darkness, I wanted the vacuum in space; the void. I heard noises, grumblings, mumblings and rumblings. “Voices of the world,” I thought to myself. They are trying, all persevering for a dream greater than self. I had that dream too. A Martin Luther King dream, a Abraham Lincoln dream, a Ghandi dream. Aspiring. Strong. I peruse their stories more than I would for my own.

I was myself but yet I could be so afraid of me. What was I afraid of exactly? The me whom the other had loved or the me whom I am afraid to show? Like the paintings in a museum, the heart sits right in the middle of the room in my body, enclosed in a box like all treasures except, it is not encoded in numbers and dials. But at least, the presence of a box had kept it safe, sane.

I saw her from afar, in a pink sweater and not because pink had been my favourite colour but because I had thought my heart would be safe out in the open with her.

But once the box had been lifted, the strong winds blew, the rains pelted hard. I fought hard against the elements, and against the odds of it. We all did. But the relentless rains tore it down. Perhaps it was meant to be this way and how life has always been, this tearing and rebuilding of things. A hope that sits in the centre of breakdown and restoration.

I looked at my heart and gave it a hopeful yet sad smile. “All good?” I asked it. “No”, came a soft reply. “It will be”, I promised it as I carefully place the broken pieces back into the box.

]]>https://jochin.com/2015/11/19/writing-me/feed/0skymusingsFirst Stepshttps://jochin.com/2015/11/19/first-steps/
https://jochin.com/2015/11/19/first-steps/#respondThu, 19 Nov 2015 13:13:56 +0000http://jochin.com/?p=2979]]>I remembered when my cousins were one and learning to grasp the art of walking. They would use their tiny strong elbows as pillars, pushing their chubby bodies until they were on fours. Hands and legs in a rhythmic synchronized motion. On some days, they would travel like this; hands and legs carrying them to their lands of utopia and imagination. I would sit on the snow-white couch and watch with deep interest. Their tiny butts, enlarged by the heaviness of their diapers bobbing up and down like ripples of waves in an ocean.

But the days that truly call for a celebration are recorded moments when the tiny tots decided to venture further than they normally would have, where an outburst of bravery finds their little hearts. While on fours, their little arms gave their bodies a final push, releasing dependence and finding independence.

The world would pause momentarily while bearing witness to these tiny milestones in the journey of life. We become ennobled by these acts, inspired by the possibility of the impossible.

Their first steps would be staggering, an uncertain venture into something new. They would fall, not once but several times and over the course of long months. But there is a voice that eggs them on, encouraging them to keep trying.

A toddler who is learning his/her first steps seems to be the most natural thing to do but there are deeper whirls of mysteries that are going on in there. I suspect that it is the very same voice that we, as adults should be looking for when we fall and like it is the most natural thing to do, we release our arms and rise.

]]>https://jochin.com/2015/11/19/first-steps/feed/0976084cb-c874-4224-a37d-e8d72304f6d4 copyskymusingsKeeping Watchhttps://jochin.com/2015/10/24/keeping-watch/
https://jochin.com/2015/10/24/keeping-watch/#respondSat, 24 Oct 2015 07:15:33 +0000http://jochin.com/?p=2974]]>It has been one of those balmy days, the skies are overcast and heavy in haze. We have been living in smog for some days now as the forest fires burn at a rapid rate that cripple the living.

Rocco is in one of his moods again. It is no surprise a dog could harbour characteristics similar to his owner and being emotional is one of them. The crows perched on the railing of the balcony have been screeching for hours now. A distraction for me from the quietness of the day, an irritant to the dog who favours his naps.

There comes a point when a decision is made to act upon a thought. I watch as my dog’s ears went taut, elevated to a peak that warns the intruder to stay off. He makes his way to the balcony, scanning the environment with his watchful eyes and at the opportune time, makes his leap.

]]>https://jochin.com/2015/10/24/keeping-watch/feed/0Rocco n CrowsskymusingsA beginning of Lovehttps://jochin.com/2015/10/11/a-beginning-of-love/
https://jochin.com/2015/10/11/a-beginning-of-love/#respondSun, 11 Oct 2015 02:29:13 +0000http://jochin.com/?p=2971]]>It has been some time since I wrote on this site. The truth is so much has happened; the many episodes that write life. I am sitting here this morning by the edge of my bed, a private space where I would write, read and ponder. The year is almost coming to an end and I am taking stock on beginnings and endings.

Beginnings and Endings; they belong to the same circle. Every beginning is also an ending of something else.

For some reason, thinking about this theory pains me. I know that while I am about to start on a new journey, it would also mean an end to something else. The control freak in me would try to find the very thing that would end and work towards the prevention of its annihilation. But try as I may, I know I will not succeed.

Beginnings are beautiful. They are the sunflowers that always smile through my window pane. Beginning are always full, like a jug of water that never empties. One can never get enough of beginnings, like how a child would for sweets and chocolates. If I could have a measuring scale for beginnings and endings, beginnings would be the part where love is at the highest. It is almost like how when the bible said, “In the beginning, there was light.” Imagine when man first saw light which illuminates all things and gave everything beauty. Color. The love that we feel for the earth, for the land. Our hearts are full. Full of love.

Endings.. I wish I could have a word for it but my heat pounds at the thought of endings. I do not treat endings lightly yet there are times when I have initiated the ending of something. Ending represent a giving up on, a decision to move on from a space. Man are creatures of perfection. We are created in perfection and destined for a greatness that is often undermined. However, we are not as good as we would like to be. This is my flaw and my imperfection.

The revelation is probably this; that in the absence of what is good, nothing can be great. My heart pains as I pen this, because I wish for love. I wish for a beginning of love. I wish for love to conquer this flawed canvas of life.

]]>https://jochin.com/2015/07/30/the-poetics-of-pain/feed/020150729_195838skymusingsGirl in the mirrorhttps://jochin.com/2015/07/20/girl-in-the-mirror/
https://jochin.com/2015/07/20/girl-in-the-mirror/#commentsMon, 20 Jul 2015 02:01:15 +0000http://jochin.com/?p=2958]]>It is one of those rare moment but for several minutes today, she finds herself staring at her soul and the sight would always shock her. It isn’t so much of the difference that grips her but the lack of frequency she commits herself to the act of looking at herself.

But it is all quite paradoxical and rather conflicting, especially if one could understanding that she is a photographer and her job is to ‘see’. Ironically, she has seen much but not at herself.

Today is one of those days. A Monday where the day is permitted the freedom to pace itself according to its demands, where moments are allowed to drag beyond the boundaries of permission. She takes liberty of this grace, an audacity that she would not have been brave enough to take on other days. Lazily, she lifts the cover of her laptop, pressing the power button and holding it down longer for a second or two.

It is the time between a ‘sleeping’ laptop and an ‘awaken’ one that her mind goes on a carousel of mindless banter.

“She is beautiful, she is not”

Staring at herself feels utterly rebellious. It is almost as though she has broken an unspoken rule. Her gaze searches for the individual parts that make her whole.

Her small slit eyes have held the gazes of many others against her very own. The ones that narrates prisms of colours, the beauty of expressions she finds hanging on the faces of strangers.

She finds her textured skin, one that has endured tedious seasons of adolescence and the changing weathers of the world. Every line, every dent representing a memory, some painful while others joyous.

Her nose, she often wonder how neglected it is. She has spend an enormous amount of effort rendering care to the other parts of herself but not her nose. However, it has been her nose that held her cries when she needed to take huge gulps of air in order to breathe through the pain. Her nose is her sole comfort.

Finally, she finds her mouth. Those lips that are stretched wide each time joy finds her heart. Colours of pink and red she would paste against their skin. She smiles slightly, the smile given to herself and for herself.